Recommending young adult books beyond bestsellers

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Sloane’s best friend is pregnant!
By Sloane’s boyfriend!
Oh, leaving town is definitely an excellent idea!!

Even with a broken hand from punching Tyler in the nose, she can enjoy the beach with her twin brother at Mom’s house in Hawai’i, pretend she doesn’t care about her former friends (girl- and boy-) in Seattle (if they would please quit texting and calling and emailing with excuses for why it happened!), and start over as just Sloane, instead of eternally being half of a duo.

She didn’t plan on an attraction to Finn that maybe might be more than a summer fling… on the beach, you’ve got to watch out for the biggest waves.

My book talk: When Sloane’s best friend Mick gets pregnant by Sloane’s boyfriend, the Seattle teen is more than ready to head to Mom’s Hawai’i home and try to find her true self with no summer romance! Swim lessons for scared-of-water young Luce are doable, even with her wrist cast, but staying away from her big brother Finn is nearly impossible.

Punching Tyler in the nose? Satisfying, if hand-breaking.
Ignoring texts from him and Mick? Difficult, but necessary.
Falling for Finn? Uh-oh…

As her Hawai’i pal Mia declares it “the summer of Sloane” to reinvent herself as single and happy, she tries to shut out the past, even as Finn is reminded of it always by his aloof father. And the days of summer count down, one by one…

Yes, books can be windows to other worlds, other lives.
Also they should be mirrors where we can see ourselves, yet the majority of kids’ and young adult books published in the US don’t reflect that. (see my June 2014 post here for statistics)

Today is Multicultural Children’s Book Day which aims to open eyes, spark discussion, provide resources, and spread the word about the available books with main characters who are not white, middle-class, and straight.

Visit the site to find myriad book lists by category, from Asian American Books for Kids of All Ages to Diverse Biography Picture Books, as well as book lists by geographic region and holidays.

You know that I recommend books outside bestsellers (where, let’s face it, the leads are most often white, hetero, economically comfortable), so I find wonderful diverse titles that lots of folks will enjoy. BookRiot’s recent article on “How to Read Diversely” highlights more ways to find good reads with diverse characters.

#ReadYourWorld or someone else’s with these recent books (click title for my no-spoilers recommendation):

Killed while running an errand for mom,
is Tarik a statistic, a symbol,
a symptom of our problems?
#Blacklivesmatter

In single-person chapters, every person shows how their version of How It Went Down is right, but the details just don’t match up. Was Tarik in the Kings gang or not? Was he as good as little sister Tina believed or as cruel as Kimberly experienced?

And how could the police release the white guy who shot Tarik, who was in the neighborhood just to borrow a car, who claimed self-defense against a teen who had no gun? (Tarik didn’t, did he?)

Written and edited well before the troubles of later 2014, this thought-provoking book was published in October, so you should be able to find it at your local library or independent bookstore.

Where does the violence end?
**kmm

Book info: How It Went Down / Kekla Magoon. Henry Holt Books For Young Readers, 2014. [author site] [publisher site] Review copy and cover image courtesy of the publisher.

My book talk: Blam-blam! Black teen shot dead by a white man’s gun – but that’s all that the eyewitnesses can agree on.

Who started it – the kid edging into gang life or the guy just passing through the neighborhood?

Was Tarik holding a gun or a candy bar? Was Jack a good citizen breaking up a gang scuffle or a vigilante doing what the cops wouldn’t?

Did senatorial candidate Rev. Sloan come to Underhill to help the community mourn and heal or to advance his campaign?

Can the late teen’s best pal Tyrell escape to college without Tarik standing between him and the Kings’ insistence that he join the gang and earn his knife?

Each friend, family member, street acquaintance, and bystander tells How It Went Down, their many voices threading throughout the book to weave a most complex picture of perceptions, assumptions, and misunderstandings. Many questions, no easy answers, a conversation which must continue. (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

My book talk: As 15 year old Lauren swoons over a cute dog trainer and wonders how can she get the senior to look at her and not just her goofy pup, she may be missing a fellow dog owner’s longing glances.

Finally getting a dog after her so-allergic sister goes away to college is a dream come true for Lauren, but if she can’t break Muckle’s bad habits… well, her best friend Robert is unhappy about the chewing and so is Mom.

Puppy kindergarten is the answer, and Adam who teaches their class for teens is so handsome. Meeting hunky Jamal is nice, but their Irish-accented leader is the one for her, she just knows!

Adam’s enthusiasm with dog agility training, plus mishaps in class and at the dog park are making it difficult for Lauren to show him how perfect they are together. And now Robert is plotting something with Jamal… is she just chasing in circles like Muckle? (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Combining emotion-packed art (be very, very glad that it’s not in full color) with the era’s poems and narratives, this book unlocks a little-known episode of American history as the “Men of Bronze” inch toward the Rhine through mud, blood, lice, and poison gas.

My book talk: Black skin, white-hot patriotism, red blood on the battlefields of France – the 369th Infantry fights prejudice from the US Army itself en route to pushing German forces back to the Rhine during the Great War.

Practicing with broomsticks instead of the new rifles issued to white troops, the black National Guardsmen nevertheless become a formidable fighting unit with the best regimental band anywhere.

When the Men of Bronze from New York complete their training in South Carolina and ship out overseas in 1914 with no parades or fanfare, they fight in the muddy, bloody trenches alongside grateful French forces, determined to reach the Rhine.

A most graphic illustrated retelling of an ignored episode of US history, Harlem Hellfighters uses the 369th’s enemy-given nickname in this true story of bravery and sacrifice.

In Chinatown’s dark alleys,
the ruthless tongs demand payment,
but the Green Turtle arises to protect the innocent!

Happy book birthday to The Shadow Hero, as the origins of the first Asian-American superhero are revealed!

I love this new joint effort of graphic novelists Gene Luen Yang and Sonny Liew – light-hearted, but underpinned with the historical accuracy which won Gene so many awards for his paired graphic novels of a pivotal time in Chinese history, Boxers and Saints (my review here) .

Get a quick look at its vintage look and action here:

The Green Turtle’s adventures continue in this short sequence published on the Tor website, too.

My book talk: As a child of Chinese immigrants, Hank expected to follow family tradition, but his mother demands that he become a superhero!

When The Anchor of Justice rescues his mother from a bank robber, she won’t be satisfied until Hank reinvents himself as a superhero, instead of being a grocer like his father.

Hank discovers that intense training and a new costume certainly don’t guarantee superhero success when his attempt to save a young lady from thugs merely earns him a beating and the crime boss’s daughter rescues herself.

Fighting against the tong’s extortion has a high price for Hank’s family, yet he vows to continue, aided by the ancient Tortoise spirit from his parents’ homeland.

As the Green Turtle, Hank battles his way into the tong’s headquarters with the Tortoise spirit’s guidance. Yet the challenges he finds there would tax any superhero’s skill and resolve.

“Sometimes a fight you cannot win is still worth fighting,” counsels the spirit of the Tortoise, and Hank is in this fight until the end.

Gene Luen Yang and Sonny Liew transform an old comic book into this great graphic novel about the first Asian-American superhero. (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

My book talk: Seven outstanding men and two groundbreaking institutions are featured in this graphic novel of little-told stories from African-American history.

Included are lawman Bass Reeves, who arrested 3,000 dangerous criminals during his 30-year career in Indian Territory, and Marshall “Major” Taylor, the Black Cyclone, fastest cyclist in the world in 1899, first black champion in any sport.

Henry “Box” Brown escaped from slavery by being packed in a crate for 27-hour wagon journey. The Noyes Academy in New England (1835) was the first integrated school, but townspeople drove them out.

From the original black pro basketball star to a magician’s greatest illusion, become more familiar with these lives which made a positive difference, despite prejudice.

A great #diversebook from my 48 Hour Reading Challenge last weekend – ask for Shelter at your local library or favorite independent bookstore. In memory of its author, the publisher is donating part of the royalties to the women’s shelter where she volunteered before her death in 2012.

Share Miguel’s story with others once you’ve finished – for some it will be interesting information; for others it will be the hope and knowledge that they need to escape family violence.

My book talk: When Mom can’t take Dad’s abuse any more and escapes with Miguel and his big sister to a shelter, the teen is certain that his father won’t rest until he finds them.

Every detail of family life must be done exactly as Dad demands, or else! At first, Mom could keep the bruises hidden when she went to work, but not this broken jaw.

Fleeing to the women’s shelter is just the first step for Mom, Ellie, and Miguel – restraining orders, new cellphones, getting off the camp bus two stops early so the shelter location isn’t known, going to court.

But Ellie’s boyfriend Diego isn’t any happier with her being gone than Dad is that his family disappeared – even in Connecticut, no piece of paper should come between a Puerto Rican man and his woman!

During this anxious summer in another town, Miguel has to decide if he must always be in control like Dad or will follow his tae kwan do instructor’s teachings and become a honorable man. (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

Auntie Mryss, cousin of Scotch’s white Jamaican dad, has been waiting for the End Times – looks like maybe they’re here and somehow related to the tarry growths inching along Scotch’s chocolate brown skin.

Hopkinson’s comments on “Noticing Race” are worth hearing, as you can well imagine that questions of race and identity have threaded through Scotch’s life for a long time before the Chaos brings every bedtime story and nightmare to life in Toronto.

My book talk: Fitting in at school becomes the least of Scotch’s worries as legendary creatures descend on Toronto with terrifying results and her big brother goes missing.

Scotch (like the Jamaican hot pepper) doesn’t stand out for being biracial at this more-diverse school. Her dancing is stand-out good, like her big brother’s rap poetry. Their conservative parents don’t like either gift. And how they turned in their own son to the police for one joint! Chuh!

The black gooey growths on Scotch’s arm worry her, the hallucinations she sees flying all over worry her, then everything goes crazy as a bubble of light zings her and Rich disappears!

A volcano erupting in Lake Ontario, monsters from myth stomping through the city streets, cell phones not working – Scotch tries to help people as she doggedly makes her way to Auntie Mryss’s house. And those things from nursery rhyme dreams appearing everywhere? Mryss is sure that Scotch is the key to fixing it all…

Why are all these subconscious images becoming real now?
Why is the black goo spreading over Scotch’s skin so fast?
Where is her brother? Where!?

Jamaican author Nalo Hopkinson brings the myths and stories of many cultures into this nightmare reality threatening her adopted Canadian hometown where a heroine who doubts her own strength perseveres amid The Chaos. (One of 6,000 books recommended on www.abookandahug.com)

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About Me:

Katy Manck, MLS
Librarian-at-large & independent book reviewer, I recommend great books beyond the bestseller lists, rather than reviewing every YA book I read. (No spoilers - I promise!) On Twitter @BooksYALove

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